April 10 & 12, 2025
Meyerson Symphony Center
Dallas, TX – USA
Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Aziz Shokhakimov conductor; Jörgen van Rijen trombone.
Nikolai RIMSKY-KORSAKOV: Capriccio espagnole
Samy MOUSSA: Concerto for Trombone and Orchestra (“Yericho”)
Igor STRAVINSKY: Le Sacre du printemps
Gregory Sullivan Isaacs | 15 SEP 2024
This past weekend, the Dallas Symphony Orchestra presented a spectacular concert of two Russian masterpieces and a new concerto for trombone. From Russia, we heard Rimsky-Korsakov’s splashy orchestral masterpiece, Capriccio espagnole. The program ended with a very different but equally splashy ballet score, Le Sacre du printemps (“The Rite of Spring”), by his prize student, Igor Stravinsky. The splashy Uzbekistani conductor, Aziz Shokhakimov, was on the podium.
(Actually, he offers another Russian connection. When Shokhakimov was born in 1988, Uzbekistan was one of the Soviet Socialist Republics from 1924 until 1991.)
In between the two Russian masterpieces, we heard a Canadian remise en bouche: the recently completed trombone concerto by Samy Moussa, the Montreal-born Germany-based composer/conductor.
The orchestra’s playing was superb throughout. Capriccio espagnole is really a concerto for the entire orchestra. It is considered a masterpiece of orchestration and has been studied by composers ever since it was written. Since it was first conceived as a violin concerto, the concertmaster has virtuoso solo work throughout that was impressively played by co-concertmaster Nathan Olson.
Also, the five principal wind players were equally impressed with the solo cadenzi that opens the fourth movement. However, every player in the ensemble, as well as whole sections of the orchestra, had lots of spectacular opportunities to display their mastery. The intonation and ensemble were exemplary. It was a joy to hear this exceptionally talented orchestra play this showpiece.
Moussa’s Concerto for Trombone and Orchestra was in another musical world. The concerto is surnamed “Yericho” (“Jericho”) after the famous and miraculous Bible story, although the reference was not all that noticeable. The soloist, Jörgen van Rijen, is one of the best trombonists in the world today. As such, he holds the prestigious Principal Trombone chair (jointly with Bart Claessens) in the superlative Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra (RCO) in Amsterdam.
Trombonist Jörgen van Rijen. (credit: Marco-Borggreve)
However, Moussa’s concerto hardly gave van Rijen much opportunity to display his virtuosity. While his assigned music was quite challenging to play, its constantly repeated minimalist scale fragments, embellished with double and triple-tongued notes, quickly outlived its welcome. For its part, the orchestra luxuriated in “new age” style chords that constantly resolved into each other. On some occasions, the orchestra actually covered the solo trombone when it was played in its middle register. It received a warm but reserved ovation.
The conductor, the impressive Aziz Shokhakimov, is much lauded these days. When he entered the Uspensky Music School for Gifted Children at the age of six, studying the violin and viola as well as conducting, Shokhakimov was already hailed as a prodigy. Since then, he has won a series of prestigious competitions and is currently enjoying a highly successful international career in both symphonic and operatic appearances. He is the Music Director of the Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg and the Artistic Director of the Tekfen Philharmonic Orchestra. Until recently, he also held some other positions, such as being the Kapellmeister for the Deutsche Oper am Rhein.
Observing him on Thursday evening, Shokhakimov appeared to be a much different conductor in the program’s first half than how he presented in the Stravinsky ballet. In both the Capriccio espagnole and the trombone concerto, he was a live wire, vibrating with energy and mirroring his hand movements throughout (frequently seen, but considered questionable conducting form).
In Stravinsky’s Le Sacre, his conducting technique was completely different. Here, he was marvelous. Incredibly controlled and precise, he no longer mirrored at all. Every single gesture he made was distinctively appropriate to the musical moment. He eschewed the use of the baton in quiet moments, crafting the flow with only his hands. But as things got more intense, his baton suddenly reappeared. Watching him work in the Stravinsky, you could see why he was a hands-down competition winner. ■
EXTERNAL LINKS:
- Dallas Symphony Orchestra: dallassymphony.org
- Aziz Shokhakimov: harrisonparrott.com/artists/aziz-shokhakimov
- Jörgen van Rijen: jorgenvanrijen.com
Read more by Gregory Sullivan Isaacs.
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